ПРОДАННЫЙ ПРАЗДНИК, УКРАДЕННАЯ ЧАСОВНЯ, ПРОИГРАННЫЙ ПРИХОД: ДЕРЕВЕНСКИЙ ПРАЗДНИК КАК СИМВОЛИЧЕСКИЙ КАПИТАЛ

Антропологический форум. 2026. Т. 69. С. 296–324.

Moroz A.

Some rather unusual stories have been recorded from time to time in various Russian regions: about one village that sold its holiday to another, about the residents of one village who stole a chapel from another one and transported it to their own village, or how a rural priest gambled away part of his parish to a priest from a neighboring village. All these stories are usually presented as curious incidents that occurred long ago, and the narrators recount what they heard from their parents, who in turn may have heard these stories from their own parents. In this way, the curious story acquires the status of a reliable account. This article proposes to examine these narratives in the context of the significance of the holiday for the rural community. Local festivals, which were celebrated and are still celebrated, albeit not as lavishly, in many villages, are dates in the Christian calendar when the residents of one village prepared to welcome guests from all the neighboring villages, organised a celebration during which a huge amount of food and drink was consumed, and then held festivities. Festive visits implied return visits — this is how groups of villages linked by mutual hospitality were formed. Apparently, narratives on these topics emphasise the significance of a holiday that is celebrated — or, for some reason, not celebrated — in a village, and also regulate the sequence of festive visits and the mutual obligations imposed by such relationships.

Keywords: праздник, символический капитал, народная религиозность, rural community, сельская община, holiday, popular religiosity, symbolical capital

Publication based on the results of: Language, literature and culture in historical and social perspective (2025)